xssh and -geometry

["John A. Krommes" <krommes goleta pppl gov>]

I connect to a remote computer via xssh, which launches an xterm running on
the remote computer.  In that xterm, I launch an application like `emacs
-geometry ...'.  It shows up on my local screen just fine, but it doesn't
respect the -geometry command.  Putting the command in remote:.Xdefaults
doesn't work either, although it does understand other stuff in there like
colors. (For that matter, even an emacs command launched from a panel
button doesn't seem to respect -geometry.)  Why is -geometry not
understood, and from where is the default size and positioning being
obtained?

I'm new to GNOME.  Thanks for any info.

---John Krommes